Covid-19 Santa Clara, CA

Dear Valued Patients,

We hope this letter finds you and your family in good health. We have exciting news! We will resume our normal business hours starting June 2, 2020. As we prepare to see patients regularly again, we want to inform you, our patient family, of the additional steps we have taken to ensure your health and safety at Smiles For Life Dental Group.

Pre-Appointment Screening: Our office will communicate with patients prior to appointments to review new office protocols and ask pre-treatment screening questions. You will be contacted via phone or email, dependent upon your communication preferences.

Arrival: We ask patients to remain in their vehicles or wait in our office building lobby located on the 2nd floor, until their scheduled appointment time to avoid congestion in the office waiting area, enabling social distancing. Please enter our office at your scheduled time. Should your provider be running behind, we will contact you on your cell phone and ask you to wait.

Assistance: Please arrive alone in the office for your appointment. In case you are a parent of a child patient, an elderly requiring assistance or someone needing a translator, and need to bring someone along into the office for assistance, please notify us before your appointment.

Patient Hand Hygiene: We will ask all patients to use hand sanitizer upon entering the office.

In-Office Screening: Upon entering our office, a team member will meet you, obtain your body temperature, and verify your answers to the pre-appointment screening questions.

Patient Attire: We ask patients to wear a mask upon arrival to the practice. Shoe covers will also be offered upon arrival.

Preprocedural Mouth Rinse: Patients will be asked to perform a mouth rinse on being seated in the clinical operatories, aiding in viral and bacterial disinfection of the oral environment.

Air Purification System: We have installed an air purification system to cycle and clean office air through medical grade HEPA filters. HEPA filtration has 0.1 micron effectiveness and can capture COVID-19 (measuring 0.125 microns). You will notice these filters in every operatory, reception area, waiting room area, effectively covering the entire office space.

Office Barriers: We have installed plexiglass barriers at the office reception and other areas of our office as an added measure for the safety of our patients and staff members.

Reception area: We have cleared our reception area of beverage bar, water dispenser and magazines. This is to avoid cross contamination of surfaces. The available seating is limited and rearranged to provide social distancing

Additional Personal Protective Equipment: All team members will wear masks continuously while present in the office. Your clinical team will be utilizing N95/ KN95 respirators, surgical masks, as well as clinical jackets/isolation gowns, face shields, eye protection, and shoe covers.

Limit In-Office Payment: In an effort to abide by social distancing guidelines and person-to- person contact, a team member will contact you prior to your appointment to set up electronic payment arrangements. Payments can also be made on your Patient Portal.

Appointment times: Please be aware that your appointment times will be extended to ensure we are abiding by our protocols and limiting the number of patients in the office at a given time. This may restrict the flexibility of appointment times available. Please make sure to confirm your appointment or give us at least 48 hours’ notice if you need to reschedule. Your timely notifying us of the extended appointment times we have reserved for you, will allow us to offer this to other patients who have been waiting for their pending visit and treatment.

Modifications to equipment: In our attempt to reduce aerosol production in the operatories, there may be some modifications to the procedures and tools used.

Staff screening and temperature checks: We have strict protocols in place for screening and temperature check on arrival for every team member daily. The Smiles for Life Dental Group staff and medical team has undergone intense training regarding office reopening and infection control protocols with regards to COVID19 pandemic. These new protocols we have set in motion will work in conjunction with our existing infection control measures to mitigate disease transmission. Our team cares deeply about your safety and we will continue to take extreme caution to maintain an exceptionally clean environment. For updates on our increased safety protocols, please refer to our Website, Facebook, and/or Instagram. We will use these platforms to keep patients updated and informed. We look forward to seeing you again and are happy to answer any questions you may have about the steps we take to keep you, and every patient, safe in our practice. To make an appointment, please call our office at (408) 500-0819. Thank you for the opportunity to serve you. We value your trust and loyalty and look forward to seeing you again.

Sincerely,
Smiles for Life Dental Group